Controversy: Reparations and Repatriation
In early October 1993, Bernie Grant was again the subject of press hysteria, when his statement on the question repatriation for Black and minoritised people in Britain, was misreported. On October 5th, The Voice newspaper ran an article entitled ‘MP Bernie Grant breaks taboo on Repatriation: ‘Take the Money and Run’. The article reported on a small meeting in Brighton that Grant had spoken at to mark the 25th anniversary of Enoch Powell’s ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech. During this, Grant referenced a recent poll that suggested more than a third of Britons were in favour of forced Black repatriation. At this meeting, Grant mentioned the feelings expressed to him by his Black constituents, wearied by British racism: “They are saying to me, ‘it’s time we left this country. It’s time we were voluntarily repatriated”. This report generated a sizable uproar, and the Labour Party immediately distanced itself from Grant’s alleged remarks. Some Right Wing figures latched onto the suggestion of voluntary repatriation as advantageous to their anti-migration and anti-multiculturalism stances, including Tory MP Winston Churchill, grandson of the former Prime Minister of the same name. In light of all this distortion, Grant clarified his position, including in an article by the New Statesman and Society: “I have not advocated repatriation, as some of this week’s headlines have said… what I am in favour of, however, is of black people talking amongst themselves frankly about how we go forward in an increasingly hostile environment”. Here, Grant also placed Reparations firmly on the agenda, as the central framework for black people in Britain to be able to discuss their present conditions, and indeed shape their futures: “My own vision of the future for us as black people is connected with the campaign for reparations for Africa… I believe that it offers us both a way of understanding our situations as black people here in Britain, as well as a glimpse of an alternative future”. On 16th December 1995 , Grant raised an adjournment debate in the House of Commons, pointing to the European Union’s International Organisation for Migration’s (IOM) existent voluntary repatriation scheme which had already assisted people to return to Jamaica. The IOM voiced its support for Grant’s call for a similar British-based voluntary repatriation scheme.
